Enforcing fiscal discipline

A council with only advisory powers will be ineffective

One of the key recommendations of the N K Singh-led committee to review the working of the Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management Act, 2003, (FRBM) is the formation of a fiscal council. This recommendation goes to the heart of the matter as to why India needed a review of the FRBM Act in the first place. The fact is, notwithstanding the onerous demand that a law passed by Parliament places on a government, at the end of the day, fiscal policy, and possible profligacy, is too intricately linked to the political economy of democratic decision-making. For instance, the recent farm